This article explores a “water footprinting” exercise jointly undertaken by the Coca-Cola Company and The Nature Conservancy (TNC). The goal was to determine the total amount of water used throughout the company’s orange juice supply chain, from the water pulled from the ground to grow the oranges to the water used in transporting the finished product.

What can we do with this information? According to the article, environmental groups like TNC can use it to monitor corporate impact and companies can use it to voluntarily pursue more sustainable and economical water use practices. Ecosystem Marketplace also has high hopes that in the long term these initiatives could develop into a water trade system similar to carbon trading.

Our CEO, Mike Van Patten, shares his perspective on the development of a regulatory water trading system in the article.

“The fact that many companies will start measuring the water content of many of their products suggests that where there is transparency in this footprint, there must be action, and a water footprint credit could be one way to offset this impact…My opinion is that a tradable water footprint credit could be used to finance water projects in areas that have limited access to water,” says Van Patten.

Mission Markets operates a private investment exchange facilitating transactions within the social and environmental capital markets. The Mission Markets platform provides companies and organizations with access to funding and impact investors an efficient way to evaluate, invest in and monitor sustainable investment opportunities.